No music. No laughter. No smoke. Just the low hum of the building itself, like it’s breathing without an audience. Sunlight leaks in through high windows, catching dust in the air. The bar is wiped down. Chairs are stacked. It smells like cleaner, old wood, and something faintly metallic underneath it all.
I keep my head down and start toward the front.
“Enjoy your sleep?”
The voice cuts through the quiet like a blade.
I stop. Slowly, I turn.
She’s standing by the bar.
Dark hair pulled back tight. Cut on her shoulders. Arms crossed. She looks like she hasn’t slept at all, eyes sharp and bright with something ugly.
Oaks’ wife.
I know it before anyone says it. I’ve seen her in Official before, in the places where women like me don’t belong. Perfect lipstick. Perfect posture. Perfect everything.
“I…” My mouth goes dry. “I was just leaving.”
“Oh, I know.” She steps closer. “Everybody knows. You were seen with my husband last night.”
My stomach drops.
“I didn’t…” A memory flashes through my mind, sharp as a slap. My hands around his neck. His hands on my hips. His breath in my hair. Laughing, twirling, dancing like I had the right. My cheeks go hot.
“Save it.” Her eyes flick down to my boots, my jacket, the way I’m holding myself together by sheer will. “You think you’re special?”
“No,” I say, because lying feels pointless. “I think I messed up.”
She laughs once, sharp and humorless. “That makes two of us.” She doesn’t blink when she says it.
I dig into my pocket before my courage runs out, pull out the folded note, and hold it out between us like a shield.
“He left me this,” I say. My voice shakes, but I push through. “Nothing happened. I swear.”
She snatches it from my hand, eyes scanning fast. Her jaw tightens. Then tightens more.
For a long moment she doesn’t speak.
Finally, she hands it back to me like it bit her. I put it away to try to make peace.
“Lucky girl,” she says quietly. Not kind. Not cruel. Just tired. “You walked away with your dignity intact. Not everyone does.”
“I didn’t know,” I whisper.
She snorts. “You never do. That’s how men like him get away with it.”
She steps aside and gives me a clean path to the door.
“Go,” she says. “Before I change my mind.”
I don’t argue.
I push out into the daylight, heart slamming against my ribs, lungs burning like I ran even though I didn’t. I don’t slow down until I’m halfway to my car.
That’s when I feel it.
That prickle between my shoulders. That sense of weight behind me.
